960 Head Gasket

960_paul · Post by **960_paul** » 22 Aug 2009, 20:23

The other day I was on my way to a job interview (always at the inconvenient times) when my 1997 960 started pouring a white smoke/steam mixture out from under the hood at a stop light. I immediately pulled into the nearist parking lot and popped the hood only to find that as I suspected, the passenger side of the engine was soaked in oil. My coolant is also a thick oily brown now. However, my oil level kept decreasing and at no time has ever shown any sign of coolant being in the oil. I caught it and stopped driving in time to save the engine, however the head gasket needs replaced. I am planning on doing the job myself, along with the help of my father who has been a mechanic for 30 years, and as such was wondering if anyone could possibly provide me with the proper procedure for this particular car , the total materials list, and what kind of special tools are necessecary for this vehicle. Thanks for the help, guys!

DanR · Post by **DanR** » 22 Aug 2009, 21:57

Here are the instructions. No real special tools are required, they are more for dealers who will be doing the work against a clock. But you will need to work around not having them, go slow and think every thing through.

You don't say how many miles you have but it might be worth replacing the valve seals, all of the coolant hoses and heat regulator while you are at it. Timing belt and the ancillary pulleys and tensioner. You will also need cam seals, spark plug o-rings and injector seals, both the doughnut and pancake type.

Take care when pulling the cams out, use both hands, one on each end, the front end there is a groove that the cam rides in, if one were to incorrectly pull at the rear of the cam, that can cause the front to crack the head.

You don't have to remove the timing gears from the cams, if you do, make sure to mark their position and which one is the intake or exhaust.

Cleaning the head surfaces is really the hardest part, use the Volvo sealant, don't use anything else but Volvo for that.

Good luck.
DanR '94 964 343,000 miles (109,000 on the new engine)

engine___cylinder_head_removal.pdf: (634 KiB) Downloaded 505 times

960_paul · Post by **960_paul** » 22 Aug 2009, 23:00

Thanks for the advice...I have roughly 150,000 miles on the engine. I am planning on purchasing a full gasket set and essentially do a full rebuild on the top end without replacing the valves or springs (unless I find it necessecary once I get it torn down). I'm not in an extream hurry to get it done, as I have a pickup truck to drive also, but I hope to get it done as soon as I can, as the truck only gets 10 mpg on a good day lol.

Post by **JDS60R** » 22 Aug 2009, 23:10

Here is the VADIS file with Pictures